Rubio slams Obama's 'leadership failure'

Freshman Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) on Friday blasted President Obama for failing to take any meaningful steps to reduce the government's budget deficit and said Obama's pending request to raise the debt ceiling again is just the latest sign of the president's failed leadership.

"When you served in the Senate in 2006, you called raising the debt limit 'a sign of leadership failure,' " Rubio wrote in a letter to Obama. "Using your own standard, this request will mark your sixth 'sign of leadership failure' on the debt ceiling issue alone."

Obama is expected to make his sixth request to raise the debt ceiling early this year, and Rubio — often considered a potential vice presidential candidate — said these requests have now become "routine" under Obama. He also added that the next request would take the U.S. debt limit to $16 trillion.

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"Instead of making debt ceiling increases a routine Washington exercise, we need to make it routine to actually spend no more than we take in," Rubio wrote. "Until then, I will oppose your request to continue borrowing and spending recklessly."

"It's a tragic reality but, on your watch, more and more people have come to believe that America is becoming a deadbeat nation inevitably heading toward a European-style debt crisis," wrote Rubio, who also called on Obama to "come forward with a real plan to tackle our debt in 2012."